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The History
History as the Immortals Know It In the beginning, there existed only the strange and primordial House of the Ever, a family of 12 immortal extraplanar beings living within their celestial plane of Stra. Each were equal in the absolute power they held, able to create and destroy matter, energy, and entire universal concepts as they saw fit. Unable to explain or understand the powers they held themselves, the House vowed to seek answers to the fervent questions they held, and so stretched their abilities to the brink to construct the cosmos and multiverse as we know it. During this creation, June and December conceived the Fourborn as servants to the House who would oversee the worlds they wrought. The Fourborn saw to it that the universal concepts ordered by the House were spread throughout the cosmos, sewing the seeds of order, war, knowledge, secrets, chaos, madness, light, creation, and life across the multiverse. Having conceived an entire universe in their image, the House sought now to learn and understand their own power through the beings they created. One such member of the House, however, was not satisfied with their current method. October believed the House was wasting their time with such frivolous creations, and wished to push their power to the absolute limit, and so attempted a dangerous ritual forever known as the Great Paradox. Wielding primordial divine might, October attempted to destroy himself, wishing to test the consequences of meeting absolute creation with absolute destruction. As a result, a nova of darkness was sent permeating throughout the universe as October was shattered into two forms: his corporeal body, now hollow and heartless, and his second form, known infamously as Sincarnus, the God of Magic and Malevolence. the Black Seeker of Sin. The House, angered by October’s dangerous experimentation, believed him too unstable to rule their multiverse, and so imprisoned him within the plane of Karul, where he rotted in solitude for millennia. It was during this time that he convinced himself that only he alone could properly wield the absolute power the House was gifted, spending his final moments within Karul plotting the downfall of his very own brothers and sisters. Aided by his shadow, Sincarnus, he freed himself from Karul, and immediately set out to reduce the House to ash, and with the element of surprise, butchered 7 of his kin and spread their severed remains throughout the infinite cosmos. Finally, November, April, June, and December managed to trap their crazed brother, engaging in a climactic battle of the ages that reduced galaxies to dust, sparked supernovas, and sent showers of comets across the skies. Defeated, October’s punishment was to be forever bound to that which he despised most: the House’s creation, a solitary world on the borders of time and space, a plane now known as Incarcia. Incarcia's Timeline The Shaping The birth of Incarcia, the Shaping began when the Fourborn were ordered by the House to oversee October’s prison plane and use their power to contain the evil lurking at its heart. At the heart of the world, just beyond October’s cell, the Abyss, the Fourborn spawned the Inner Planes, a twisting storm of elemental energy that gave way to the primordials, whose mere conception introduced shape and geography to the once empty land. They continued on, forging the Lower Planes from frost and bedrock to serve as home for their prison’s wardens, the devils. They then crafted the Upper Planes from stormclouds, thunder, and lightning to serve as their observatory and as home for their celestial offspring. Finally, they molded the Seven Moons of Incarcia to serve as constant reminder of October’s crimes. The Age of Legend (Years 0 - 1,000) The first true era of Incarcia as known to mortals, whose conception came from the intersecting of each of the Fourborn’s domains and powers. During this time, the hardy dwarves shook themselves from the stone of the southmost badlands of Tarak, while the god-fearing celestial elves descended from the northern mountains of Orusara. Meanwhile, on the humble island of Satrum, the cunning gnomes awoke from the very forest itself. Most notable, however, is the appearance of the giants in the great Voctoruush Mountains, who founded the first true civilization of Incarcia, the Kingdom of Ganoc, whose influence was felt across the land for a thousand years as they enslaved the lesser races and eventually, each other. Soon afterward, the celestial elves founded the divine Kingdom of Mithas, led almost directly by the God of Light and Creation, Hessuria, who bestowed upon the ancient celestial elves godly secrets of creation which allowed them to forge incredible artifacts and cities the likes of which have yet to be seen again. As well, the grey elves departed from the worship of the Fourborn and began pagan practices, forever tainting their link with the divine but becoming masters of stealth, subterfuge, and blood sacrificial magic. As well, the high elves, discovering strange secrets of the Astral Sea and believing themselves superior to their elven brethren, broke away from the Kingdom of Mithas and founded the reclusive nation of Nexicir. To the south, the dwarves expanded wildly across the land, diverging into two distinct types, the mountain dwarves of the Taraki Badlands and the hill dwarves of the Skalloch Lowlands. Soon afterward, the mountain dwarves forged the Infernal Throne from the fire, frost, and lightning of the ancient tridragon Araxx’neltiron, while the hill dwarves founded the Twin Kingdoms of Modugon and Dirge. On Satrum, the forest gnomes used the power of Venokath to construct the rock gnomes as loyal slaves to their Republic of Falthiron. Toward the end of this age, the humans also made an early appearance as slaves to the giants of Ganoc, forming a bitter schism between the two races that lasted to the modern day. The Age of Defilement (Years 1,000 - 2,000) The second era of Incarcia, marked by the first appearances of Sincarnus, whose influence was beginning to be felt even through the barriers erected by the House and the Fourborn. Days grew short, and cold darkness coated the land in a foul air that polluted food and water like poison. In the Upper and Lower Planes, the Fourborn noticed a dramatic decrease in their power, and when attempting to contact the House for answers, their questions were met with silence. Soon, their devilish and celestial children took notice of this, and it was not long before a great shift in power took place. A branch of both devils and celestials broke away from the following of their now weakened rulers and soon earned a new title for themselves as the Fey, a defection from the Gods who founded their own plane of the Feywild amongst the mortal world. The remainder of the celestials and devils took notice of this as well, and through the influence of Sincarnus, many came to the conclusion that the Gods were unfit to rule with such limited power, and so overthrew the Fourborn and cast them to the very earth of Incarcia to rot with the living. In the north, the Kingdom of Mithas suffered from severe drought, famine, and plague. Desperate to see an end to their plight and neglected by the Fourborn, Queen Kaena attempted to use the power of the Innara, the artifact that granted the celestial elves their power, to save their land from destruction. The attempt was successful, but in a manner most unexpected to the Queen. The Innara shattered, and the connection that bound the celestial elves to their Gods was no more. The remaining elves grew cold and corpselike, and they were filled with a new hunger, not one for food and drink, but one for blood, and so the first vampires were born. Puzzled and spiteful toward their fallen Gods, they turned their backs to faith and split into three distinct clans each with their own views on their newfound gift: the Ezerihn, who used the shards of Innara to further transform themselves but at the cost of their humanity, the Konorihn, who fully embraced their new hunger, becoming primal and bloodthirsty warriors, and finally, the Thassarihn, who believe that their gift can be best used to rule the lesser races from the shadows through politics and subterfuge. In the Voctoruush Mountains, the humans successfully rebelled against their giant captors, afterwards fleeing to the northern Plains of Burg, the southern Sertheron Mountains, and across the sea to the peninsula of Wendon. There, they formed many city-states and small kingdoms and integrated with their neighbors while the humans of Wendon began a vicious rivalry with the many vampire clans of the fallen Mithas. Similarly, the rock gnome slaves of Falthiron successfully rebelled through the invention of the warforged, living constructs made of metal and wood and bound with a soul, a method devised and held as a great secret by the rock gnomes possessing its power. The warforged, through sheer strength and numbers, successfully managed to topple the Republic and take control with their rock gnome creators, afterwards exiling the forest gnomes across the sea where they founded the city-state of Izer, and with the aid of the shadow Sincarnus, began the first true studies into the subject of dark magic, with the intent to reclaim their homeland from their enemies. Afterwards, many of the warforged wished to discover a place in the world to call their own, and so set across the seas to the frozen islands of Mastia, where they soon earned a name for themselves as excellent naval fighters and raiders. In the far south, the mountain dwarves were plunged into chaos when the heir to the throne was executed by the giants of Ganoc. Instilled with burning rage, Alkhaz (emperor) Furin committed to a full scale invasion of the giant Kingdom, and with the aid of the humans of Sertheron and Burg, crushed the giants and left them near extinct, slaughtering every man, woman, and child in their path. However, unbeknownst to the invaders, where murder and destruction congregates, so too, does Sincarnus, and soon the Voctoruush Mountains were wrapped in an impenetrable darkness that spawned the first of the aetherborn, a race of shortlived, near-shapeless beings born purely of magic. The land beneath the shadow was twisted and distorted into a nightmarish reality, one of madness, hatred, and sorrow, whose horrors murdered countless soldiers or, if they were lucky, drove them to suicide. None escaped the mountains save for the aetherborn, whose determination and drive sent them wide and far across Incarcia. Throughout this time many more aetherborn were conceived through both Sincarnus and alternate means, such as blood magic and divine magic, with each aetherborn unique to the type of magic that which spawned them. The Age of Tooth and Nail (2,000 - 2,500) This age is marked by the falling of the Fourborn’s power and the rise in worship of the Court of Storm and Frost, the Church of the Black Seeker, and the Boundless Lord. As well, it is marked by the beginning of a new technological era, welcoming firearms, cannons, and even the basic use of electricity in the most advanced regions of Incarcia. During this time, the Fourborn were known to have adopted forms resembling that of mortals, walking among them and spreading faith and gaining power from the shadows. In the Feywild, the Court of Storm and Frost was founded, a religion and organization following the Archfey Belicira and Remogg, dedicated to instating Fey rule throughout Incarcia. As well, the Boundless Lord made itself known to mortals, an entity from beyond the Astral Plane whose gifted power could warp the laws of reality and erase the sanity of those unprepared to behold it. The belief of the Boundless Lord was spread widely throughout Nexicir, where the high elves embraced its untold power as if drawn to it like moths to candlelight. In Izer, the forest gnomes quickly adopt the faith of the Sincarnus, still spiteful of the Fourborn, whose gift betrayed the gnomes and cost them their homeland. Meanwhile, the shadow of Sincarnus grew ever stronger, further plunging the world into darkness and corrupting the weak-of-will wherever it went. As war broke out and vile temptation spread, Sincarnus fed, introducing a new age of dark magic. Because of this, the humans of Burg founded the Felfry Blades, an organization of elite fighters and paladins trained in the dispelling and nullification of Sincarnus. On the other hand, the vampires of Clan Ezerihn founded the Church of the Black Seeker, dedicated to spreading the influence of Sincarnus across the world so that magic might be embraced rather than hated. In the southern lands of Incarcia, the mountain dwarves are fractured into hundreds of weakened clans when the death of Alkhaz Grulak sends his many heirs into a violent power struggle. Willing to do anything to see himself on the Infernal Throne, the crippled Haggrond Duergarn betrayed the dwarven heirs, his brothers, during the Blood Feud (a trial by combat meant to determine an heir if there is no strong claim). Using poison to assassinate the four heirs, Haggrond successfully became Alkhaz of Tarak, but over the years, his dynasty grew frail, mad, and twisted, taking on a darker appearance with piercing red eyes, ultimately forming a third dwarven race known as the under dwarves, or duergar, descendants of this mad king. In Wendon, the humans mastered the art of vampire-slaying after the discovery of gunpowder and firearms, and after centuries of torment and oppression from their bloodsucking neighbors, began a 500-year-long genocide, nearly wiping out the vampiric race and sending them fleeing to every corner of the world. To those still clinging to hope in this forlorn world, it is believed that this is in part due to the secret influence of Neverother, who wished to balance the mistakes made by Hessuria and send the vampires into extinction. Meanwhile, many a vampiric clan faulted their loss in the complacency of their rulers, with major revolution and reform shaking the foundations of a once culturally-elven society, becoming the true villains of the night as they are known today. In Izer, the forest gnomes successfully completed an incredibly powerful ritual that caused an event known to the world as the Deep’s Reckoning, causing the sea to rise and swallow Satrum whole, devastating the rock gnome capital and sending a torrent of dark magic swirling about the ruins. This ritual permanently stained the land surrounding Izer as well, causing the dead to rise in the thousands and giving way to the Indigo Curse, a plague-like curse that caused the living to drown on land, bloating their bodies and transforming them into sea spawn. Now, Izer is wrapped in a swirling vortex of undead and cursed, with only its wards and magical barriers to stand between its citizens and Sincarnus. In Nexicir, the high elves ascend in the power of the Boundless Lord, learning the gift of Channelling, allowing their most devout of followers to witness the universe as the Boundless Lord sees it. Little is known of this ability, only that through it, the High Priests have been able to maintain peace and solitude for their kingdom for half a millennium. This leads us to the modern day. The world struggles beneath bloody and tyrannical rule, governed by godless rulers whose intents are only to conquer and control. Almost all of those who have come into power have done so through violence, betrayal, and selfishness, leaving the just to crumble beneath the boots of the wicked. Incarcia has been forsaken by the House, the Gods are overthrown, and a new age has begun, an age of darkness, an age of blood, an age of cruelty. An age for the mortal.